This morning I thought I would talk about grief, anxiety and fear. I lost my husband 9 years ago. He was my best friend and soulmate. We met at college and although at first I found him a bit ‘different’ – his mum used to dress him in terrible clothes – and he wore really thick spectacles – we really got on well together. He found me bossy and argumentative. Somehow it worked. We were together for 35 years and were enough for each other. We had two sons and life just sped by. He had cancer when he was 29 and fortunately with chemotherapy and operations, he recovered and we were told it was unlikely to return after 10 years. We managed to spend another 23 years together and then the cancer returned and spread everywhere – from learning it was back to his death was just one week. No real time to say goodbye, but how do you? The beautiful thing was that when he was admitted to hospital for his treatment (something he said he would never go through again), both our sons visited him and had separate conversations with him and I will always remember how they chatted and were able to have this last time together (although they didn’t know it at the time). God was certainly present with us and in it with us.

I’m crying as I write this because time is a strange thing. It doesn’t feel like 9 years, I feel a strong grief as if it was yesterday. Trying to sum up how it feels to lose someone so close, I can only say it is as if half of you has disappeared and ceased to exist. You’re going around talking to people, living your life but you’re not whole anymore.

I got through all of this by having a strong faith in God and by doing the best I could for my sons who were 13 and 17 at the time. A friend gave me some prayers for grief that also help with anxiety, depression and fear and I wanted to share them with you. I will do this on a separate page so that they are available when needed.

God bless you all, especially those who are suffering with grief x

Today’s reading was about Naaman being cured of leprosy and about heaven being ‘closed’ for over three years. I sometimes have wondered particularly during this pandemic if our prayers haven’t been answered because we aren’t listening to God or what the environment around us is telling us.

We can go our own way, we have free will, but if we choose to live lives outside of God’s rules, can we then expect him to step in whenever we have problems, especially one as big as Covid has been. I don’t by any means want to say that this has happened as a punishment but that the way we live our lives has brought this on us and we are reaping what we have sewn.

I do hope that after this pandemic has ended we will all wake up and see that we have to live different lives. We have to stop destroying our environment and nurture what we have left. If not for ourselves, then for the sake of our children and future generations.

Job 12 7:10

“But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind.

Let’s look after the beautiful creation God has given us.

God bless

Today in our readings for Mass we are reminded of the Ten Commandments. I think the word commandment can be a bit challenging for some, especially if they rebel against any kind of authority almost instinctively. You could call them recommendations in a sense. God is recommending a way for us to live that will make us happy and live in harmony with each other if we can obey these ‘instructions’. The fundamental message is about respect – for God, for each other and each other’s property. Most of the problems in our lives occur when we fail to follow these rules. Where there is no respect society starts to break down. You can see it in the behaviour of children towards their parents and teachers. Losing that fundamental belief in respecting their authority means that they set their own rules and unfortunately pushing boundaries becomes something they do without any guilt as they don’t recognise that there are any boundaries.

We are living in a society that is a product of that loss of respect, worsening as the older generations leave us and a new way of living is becoming apparent. The laws in our society can’t replace these fundamental commandments – I see them as more ethical, inbuilt laws that we obey because we choose to and are taught to from an early age. Law and ethics work hand in hand, you need laws to uphold society but you need ethics to make society a more loving environment in which to live. The law can’t dictate what you believe to be right in every respect.

The law has sanctions and we pay the price while we are here. Failure to obey the commandments may not exact a price while we are alive, but there is a greater price involved that we don’t see – distancing ourselves from our God.

I hope that I have managed to give a good viewpoint about these commandments and don’t forget, we have a merciful God more than ready to forgive us when we get it wrong, we just need to say we’re sorry.

God bless x

I am always amazed at how much you can glean from a parable. I have read the parable of the prodigal son so many times and each time you can pick up a different meaning and react to it in a different way. You can look from the perspective of the father, the prodigal son and the son who stayed at home and you can even change your opinion over time about how you feel concerning each individual in the story.

One thing that came to me today was how the other son was refused the fattened calf when he asked to have it so that he could have a celebration with his friends. The father was keeping the fatted calf for the return of his other son and would have been looking out for him every day anxious about him and praying for his return. Now thinking about this stay at home son and about this fact that we are given, could it be that although he did his duty as asked, didn’t complain and caused no issues, he bore no love for his father or his brother. His life was about duty, expectation, working so that he would inherit his share rather than thinking about his sibling and his relationship with his father. When he hears that his brother has returned and how happy his father is and how he demonstrates that, he reacts with anger that his brother is back and treated that well. He isn’t relieved and doesn’t care how happy his father is, he just relates everything back to himself, his hard work and how he feels bitter about it.

We can be like that – doing what we think is our duty, but not really engaging our hearts in the work we do. We tick boxes and think that we are doing well and should be rewarded when really there is no love there for God or for others. It is easy to slip into this busy kind of life and put our feelings to one side.

I do this and it isn’t easy to change. I want to do well but need to work on making sure that any kindness I perform is done solely in an unselfish way, with thought for the person I am doing it for rather than improving myself through doing good works. Jesus asks to do these good works in his name and with love for others, as action without love is empty.

One of my favourite quotes from the Bible:

1 Corinthians 13 1

If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is notproud.

God bless

I am getting to grips with posting blogs, and finding my bearings around my site. I am scrambling about, one moment thinking I am improving and know what I am doing and the next a block appears and can’t be edited, then I have to work out why etc. etc. I am going to persevere because I want to feel I am doing something – well or poorly is something I will find out further up the line.

Today’s readings have given me lots to think about. The story of Lazarus and the rich man worries me. I do walk past beggars and if I do drop any money in their hats, I don’t stop to talk to them, just smile and walk by and say a small prayer for them. Is that loving them enough? I do see others stop to talk to them and wish I could think of how I could do that. A lot of people want to know how they got into this position, why they had come so low that they had to live on the street and beg. I don’t know if they like being cross examined like that or if they tell the truth about their situation. A lot of the time drugs and drink are involved, but some people lose their jobs, their health deteriorates or their marriages break up and they have nowhere to go and it is all downhill for them. The rich man in the Lazarus story doesn’t seem to notice the sores or desperation of the man sitting on his doorstep. We are told that Lazarus would eat the crumbs from the rich man’s table if he could, so not even the unwanted leftovers are given to him.

We can only do our best and at the very least say a prayer for those who are in this position. In some areas there are so many beggars you can’t give to them all. I think the biggest message is to care, open our eyes, see these people and their needs and pray for them:

‘Lord, please protect and heal this person. You know what their needs are more than we do. Father of all, comfort them through your Holy Spirit and may they feel loved and valued and above all may they be given the grace to find you and have faith and trust in you, through Christ Our Lord. Amen.’

I grew up in a catholic family and it is a faith I feel comfortable with following. I dropped out of going to church for a long time during my university years and for about a decade after and then returned. I still prayed, mostly the Our Father and a few short prayers for my family and I feel I kept in touch with my God. It was also having my own family too and wanting my children to be brought up to believe the same things that I did. When I returned so much had changed that I didn’t recognise the Mass at all. Before, I could visit any church and would be able to follow the Mass, say the responses and kneel, stand at the right moments. Suddenly I was in the dark. Latin had disappeared, (I’m not complaining, it is a beautiful language but I understand many can’t relate to a latin Mass if not used to it), and the choreography, responses and everything I thought I knew were different. I persevered for my children’s sake and began to feel as if I belonged after quite a long time. 

The trouble with this idea of belonging is that it doesn’t last – you worry that your church isn’t proactive enough, friendly enough, doing enough and you look at other churches and are tempted to experiment, especially if it isn’t a ‘comfortable’ church to belong to, there are issues with other people, lack of connection, lack of interaction. It may be that there is no such thing as a perfect church as we are all imperfect, you can try others until you find your fit, but try not to lose your way when you do that.

We have a very rudimentary idea of the kind of church God wanted us to have. We have the words at the Last Supper ‘do this in memory of me’ and Jesus making Peter his rock ‘and on this rock I will build my church’. No blueprint for how we should construct our church other than this and the greatest commandment: to love God and each other and we manifest this within our church. We often don’t manage this. People are leaving the church in droves and we have to question why? Modern life is shutting God out – wealth, internet, freedom, you can name so many things and they get in the way of our journey with God. Poverty and suffering can bring us back as we can focus on what matters: our faith and relationship with God and a greater reliance on him.

I think when listening to someone or reading what they have to say, you need to know what their dogma is – what are the fundamental tenets they hold. First and foremost, belief in the resurrection is a must – what are we all doing if we don’t believe that after we die there is another existence? To cease to exist after death doesn’t make sense to me. I was very surprised when I met someone a while ago who told me they go to a church which they call a christian church but they don’t believe in the resurrection. How do they give people who mourn someone who has died any comfort or hope? What about those that lead dreadful pain-filled short or long lives – do we say tough – sorry but the only thing you have to look forward to is death? God is here and loves you but once you die, that’s it? I did say I’d rather go to the pub. Going to church offers me hope in an eternal life above all else. How could God love us if he creates us and then just as a model has its use then becomes scrap, we no longer matter enough to sustain our existence? Each and every one of us is unique, we all have something to offer no matter how small. God loves us to distraction and wants us to be with him for eternity.

St Paul called his journey to God a race that he would run until the end. It is a struggle to keep going sometimes – people, money worries, deaths, illness can all put you off course – don’t compare yourself to others either – there will always be people who appear more holy than you. You can only walk your own path!

God bless,